Captain Jelly Belly will be starting preschool in the fall, and Gal Smiley will be going the year after that, so although it’s still early we are starting to think about me going back to work. When I took the time off to be with the kids I knew it would be tough coming back — in the high tech industry it’s so easy to lose your contacts and your skills, and new technologies are coming along all the time and when you’re not keeping up to date, you’re quickly obsolete as a designer. So either I’ll have to spend some time on my own, or even in courses, brushing up my coding skills, or I can take this as an opportunity to consider training for a completely new career.
Here are some occupations I would love to have:
- Traffic Flow Modeller
- Book Rebinder and Repairer
- Doctor (but sadly, unlikely to happen as I’ll never afford the tuition or the time — if only I could live life over!)
- Oscar-winning Screenwriter
- Best-selling Author
- Child Nutritionist
- Seamstress (not a designer — I don’t care about inventing art, just the mechanics of making it happen)
- Member of Hi-5 (maybe they could change their name to Hi-6?)
- Governor General of Canada
- Anything that will have me at CBC Radio — research, copywriter, on-air personality, CEO
- Newspaper/magazine Movie Reviewer
So many choices! Good thing I have a year or so to decide.
TurtleHead 
Well, it’s very true that you can do anything you can put your mind to, so just go with something you’re passionate about.
I just started a night class in Photography. It’s purely interest, rather than to break into a new field, but I really surprised myself with how exciting it feels to be doing something completely new and different that may actually allow me to express some freakin’ creativity.
I think if I were in your shoes I’d take a gamble on something new from I.T. – the worst thing that could happen is you don’t like it and you try something else!
As an aside, I think my instructor might finally be my ticket to getting a coveted Media Pass. He seems to have an angle worked out. I’ll ask him in a few weeks – best not to appear eager…
Fabulous! If you do get one, I’d love to hear how — not that I need one or anything, I’m just curious about how you become one of the coveted few. Does this mean you will get into concerts for free, as well as being able to get photo access to the stage/band? Sooooo coooool.
I think night classes are definitely the way to go when exploring new fields. I’ll have to look around and see what is available for a few test runs. I assume you are going to a local college for the course? Or is it a city-run thing?